


tangled in the red strings

by chadsuke



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-13
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2019-07-11 17:48:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15977363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chadsuke/pseuds/chadsuke
Summary: You learn to hide your soulmate markings very quickly.Most of the time, knowing someone’s soulmark means absolutely nothing – it’s predictable, it’s safe, there’s nothing to it. But. But not always. And no ninja wants to let out their secrets, so everyone hides them, aside from the powerful, aside from those who have their soulmates and stand proud and true.After all, when your soulmark is the symbol of your soulmate’s village, it can be very, very dangerous to let others know.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY CONTENT WARNINGS FOR YOU.
> 
> orochimaru being a horrifying creep as per usual. tayuya/kin is a p codependent in a kinda unhealthy relationship - they're fucked up kids in a fucked up scenario. it's really more sad tbh than anything else.
> 
> mentions of child abuse and some suicidal thoughts.

 You learn to hide your soulmate markings very quickly.

Most of the time, knowing someone’s soulmark means absolutely nothing – it’s predictable, it’s safe, there’s nothing to it. But. But not always. And no ninja wants to let out their secrets, so everyone hides them, aside from the powerful, aside from those who have their soulmates and stand proud and true.

After all, when your soulmark is the symbol of your soulmate’s village, it can be very, very dangerous to let others know.

* * *

The first time Kin molds her chakra, her soulmark appears. Just like clockwork.

She hasn’t met Orochimaru yet – she doesn’t know how much of a blessing that is, not yet – but she’s copying the ninja she’s seen, desperately trying to climb the side of a building to get away from the children that torment her. She sticks, she pinwheels her arms, and manages to scramble up the wall, fingers digging into any grooves she can find, so so scared and crying and gritting her teeth until-

Until she pulls herself over the edge of the roof and collapses there. She breathes heavily, in and out, waiting and hoping until there are no more voices following, until they’ve faded into the distance, and she can _go._

It’s not til later, when she reaches her makeshift “home”, tucked away in an alley, that Kin realizes her soulmate marking has appeared. She’s lifting her shirt when she sees it, and she gazes it from upside down, eyes wide. It’s swirled around her navel, but even from this angle, there’s no mistaking it: a stylized leaf.

Her soulmate is from Konoha.

It’s a startling, _aching_ thought, because Konoha is so far away from her little village that it could be in another _world_ for all it’s relevant. There’s nothing she can do about it. Nothing at all.

(The placement of the mark makes her wonder, too. It’s supposed to mean something, according to her late father’s half-forgotten stories. Her mark, swirled around her navel – something that has no purpose, now – is that what it means? She can do nothing about it, it’s useless?

The thought hurts.)

She pushes the thoughts away. Aside from a few daydreams, when things go particularly wrong, of her strong, fierce, shining Konohan-in-armor coming to rescue her from the slums. It’s not going to happen. She’s going to live here the rest of her life, and never know what mark lies on her soulmate’s.

* * *

Kin is rescued, and it’s not by a Konohan-in-armor. It’s Orochimaru.

For one long, excruciating week, Kin wonders if it’s _him._ If Master Orochimaru is her soulmate, and she’s cautious around him. Unsure. Not all soulmates are romantic, she knows this, and while Orochimaru could be _her_ soulmate, _her_ Konohan-in-armor come to save her, it seems so baffling that she would be _his._ She can offer him nothing but her service, nothing but her loyalty-until-death, and he needs- No, he _deserves_ more than that.

Those thoughts are dashed away, broken into pieces, when he explains to her _Otogakure._ His village, his new village of the ninjas who have been born in places where they would not have succeeded. It’s striking. It’s inspiring. Not everyone is fortunate enough to be born in a ninja village, and so many are born in poverty and their talents _languish._

He will find them, he promises, and Kin feels _hope_ and _adoration_ and so many other things twisted into one curled in her stomach. She ties her brand new forehead protector around her head, and the future feels so _bright._

She’s a Sound Ninja. That’s her mark. And maybe – maybe – she might get to meet her soulmate, now. Ninjas travel. Ninjas have exams in other villages, they have missions, there are so many different possibilities-

She just hopes she doesn’t meet him across the battlefield.

* * *

As Kin grows, the shape of her soulmate twists and turns and changes. Not the symbol – the symbol stays the same. Konoha, around her navel. She always wears a full shirt to make sure it’s covered. But no, how she… imagines her soulmate. That takes a turn.

When she was younger, she imagined a Konoha knight. A brave man, ready to carry her away and save her from the poverty she was in. Bold, strong. Once she learned what it was to be a shinobi, the shape changed. No longer did she long for a Konohan knight – but a clever shinobi, powerful and quiet and willing to leave Konoha for her sake.

Now, as she stares at Tayuya in one of the practice rooms, she realizes she’s made an error. Her soulmate is a _kunoichi._ (Or at least – she hopes it is.)

Across the way, Tayuya catches her staring and winks at her. Kin turns red and flees.

* * *

Still, she learns that that is Tayuya’s favorite training room. None of the Oto nin have a _regular_ training area or a _regular_ schedule – that’s just asking to get yourself ambushed – but she comes to this one the most frequently.

So Kin checks it regularly. Ostensibly, she tries to convince herself that it’s because Tayuya is _strong._ While Kin is only genin-level (talented genin-level, maybe almost-chunin, but genin nonetheless), she’d be surprised if Tayuya wasn’t upper chunin or even special jounin level. Hell, some days, she wonders if Tayuya could be a jounin.

You weren’t limited, in Oto, to the traditional shinobi levels. Orochimaru assigned you to what he felt was fitting for that particular mission, or that particular day, and you learned to slip into each role seamlessly.

Power-wise, though, Tayuya is far above Kin. She’s just watching her to _learn_ , she tries to tell herself. They’re both genjutsu users, even though their techniques are very different, and she definitely can learn something from the stronger shinobi.

So when Tayuya speaks to her, Kin tries to pretend that she hasn’t desperately wanted this for so, so long. The redhead’s eyes gleam. “Hey, Tsuchi – do you want to fight me or something?”

Kin swallows sharply, and tries not to blush. “If you want your ass kicked, sure.”

It’s bravado, and they both know it. There’s no way that Kin could beat Tayuya, even if she was fighting for her life. It’s just almost… obligatory, to not automatically scrape and bow, to immediately go head-to-head and pretend like you stand a chance.

It doesn’t stop Tayuya from kicking her ass in return, though.

* * *

They spend more time together, and Kin knows Orochimaru is watching. It’s fine, though – she trusts him. If Kin and Tayuya weren’t allowed to be together, he would stop them.

As it is, they train together, they eat together, they spend their off-mission time together. (Which isn’t a lot, granted, but still.) Kin has never… felt wanted by another person like this, before. The only time she’s ever been wanted is with Orochimaru, and that’s a different kind of wanted. This, with Tayuya…

She thinks they’re friends. Kin has never had a friend before.

She’s never had someone she’s wanted to spend time with, that she’s wanted to be around, that she’s wanted to be with like this…

Kin lets her hand drift to her stomach as she stares at herself in the mirror. She wishes she didn’t have the Konoha leaf around her navel. She wishes she had a music note.

It would be nice if Tayuya was her soulmate, instead. Kin thinks she wants that more than friendship.

* * *

Despite the amount of blood on her hands, despite the amount of times she has viciously murdered another human being on Orochimaru’s orders and not felt a hint of shame or regret, Kin grew up a little sheltered. Well – not necessarily _sheltered._ Ignorant was maybe a better word.

Particularly when it came to “matters of the heart”.

Which is why she's completely caught off guard when Tayuya asks her one day, casually as can be: “Do you want to go out with me?”

Kin stares at her. “Bwuh?”

Tayuya flushes, and wow, okay, that looks cute on her. “We just… hang out a lot. And I like. Well. Both guys and girls. Never mind, fuck it, this was a stupid idea.”

She goes to march off, and Kin almost lets her before, abruptly, her mind comes back and she snags Tayuya’s arm. “Wait, wait!” The redhead stops. “You just caught me off-guard.”

Kin looks at her, half-pleading, and Tayuya looks back at her. It’s… vulnerable. They’re vulnerable. It’s more than Kin has felt with another human being in a long time (she has her doubts that Orochimaru is a human being – he feels more like a force of nature and a messiah wrapped up in one to be human), and she bites her lip. “I just… you’re not my soulmate.”

Tayuya scoffs at that, tossing her head. “I don’t care. My soulmate’s from _Taki._ ” Kin gapes at the way she says it so openly. “I’m not hunting them down. Why would I?”

That’s not a question that Kin has ever thought about it. When she was younger, the image of her soulmate was the one thing that kept her going, the idea that one day she’d be saved. And then- then Orochimaru came and saved her. He has given her a purpose, he has given her everything she needs, and now she has Tayuya who wants to be with her. Why _does_ she need a soulmate aside from stories from a pathetically dead father who beat her half the time anyway?

She doesn’t. That line of thinking is naïve, and she’s ashamed that she hadn’t questioned it before now. It had always been, and Orochimaru had never challenged it, that Kin didn’t take the time to think about it.

Didn’t take the time to think about it because Orochimaru didn’t say anything? Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.

Kin shakes her head. “You’re right. Fuck, you’re right.” She reaches out to take Tayuya’s hand, and the thirteen-year-old squeezes back, giving her a fierce smirk. “Yeah, let’s do this. Me and you.”

* * *

It becomes that way. She’s rarely Kin Tsuchi when not on missions. Tayuya isn’t just Tayuya. They’re Kin and Tayuya, and everyone knows where one is, you can find the other. When Kin finishes her debriefing on a child her team saved, Tayuya is the one to greet her, the one to laugh at the way she describes how she caved in the father’s head, how the mother had _screamed_ and the child had _smiled._ When Tayuya breaks Kin’s nose in practice, they don’t track down a healer until long after Kin’s gotten her back, ripped her earlobe and half and left their blood mixed all over the training room floor.

They chase each other in the hallway and bowl over unsuspecting shinobi – serves them right for not paying attention – they sleep in the same bed, wrapped around each other, better protection better comfort better _sleep_ , and walk everywhere holding hands, squeezing so tight that sometimes they break skin and then they laugh and laugh. Kin always smears her blood on Zaku’s face and Tayuya cackles at the faces he makes and it’s _glorious._

It’s also no wonder that Orochimaru asks her about it.

Kin isn’t called in to see her Kage alone very often – actually, she can count on her fingers the number of times it’s happened – and she prostrates herself before him. It’s not required, but she… she feels it’s right. She owes him this.

And besides – it makes him chuckle, laughing quietly as he tells her to rise. The genin scrambles to her feet, and Orochimaru’s eyes glitter as he looks her over top to bottom. “So,” he says, and he draws it out as she tries not to tense. “You and Tayuya, Kin?”

She relaxes, just a fraction. If this is all it’s about, this is _easy._ She nods. “Yes, sir.”

He continues to watch her, not blinking. “If you had to choose between Tayuya and I, who would you choose?”

There’s not even a moment of hesitation. “You.” The thought of betraying Orochimaru, of defying the one who gave her so much, who saved her from the scraps and gave her power and purpose and meaning and-

Why? Why would she _ever?_

Besides, she knows it’s a hypothetical question, a scenario she shouldn’t have to ever face, especially from the way her kage’s lips spread into a smile. He reaches forward, cupping her chin with slender fingers, and she stares up at him, unafraid. “Good. Remember this.” She gives the tiniest nods, not wanting to disturb his hand, and he chuckles again, tracing his fingers up her jaw and smoothing over her hair. “Enjoy your time with Tayuya. But do not forget who you have pledged your loyalty to, hm?”

“Never,” she breathes, knees trembling, as he gives her hair one last stroke and pulls away. “I will never, my kage.”

* * *

There’s a buzz around the base, an infectious feeling in the air that leaves Kin feeling deeply curious. While her missions have decreased lately, that’s the only noticeable change around her. There’s information that she’s not privy to, here, floating throughout the base; she goes to Tayuya.

Her girlfriend grimaces. “Sorry, Kin. Confidential. You’ll know if you need to know.”

Kin sighs. She had hoped for something different, but that’s just the way it is. “Alright.” She tries not to feel bitter about the fact that Tayuya knows – her girlfriend is stronger, much stronger than her, it makes sense that she’d be privy to more, but it still stings.

Tayuya seems to sense it, and she scowls, thumping her first down on Kin’s head. “It’s not a big deal, dumbass. Come on, fight me.”

The genin scowls right back at her. “Fine!”

* * *

It ends in blood, they make Zaku scream like a civilian, and life’s back to ‘not so bad’.

* * *

Kin’s bitterness over the situation quickly vanishes a few days later, though, when she’s called in to meet Orochimaru with Dosu and Zaku. They have a mission – a special mission, the vanguards of Orochimaru’s real plan, and Kin has never felt such excitement pump through her.

Orochimaru’s planning on invasion. An invasion! They’re going to bring down Konoha from the inside out, and her team – well, okay, Dosu’s team – will be the first ones in. They’re going to infiltrate the chunin exams, take down Sasuke Uchiha, and then help the sound nin kick the Konohans’ ass.

This? This is going to be _fun._

She greets Tayuya with a grin on her face and a skip in her step after her debriefing, lifting the redhead and twirling her around. They laugh, and Tayuya squeezes her as she’s set down. “He told you about the plan?”

Kin nods. “ _Yes._ I’m part of it – but I can’t tell you what.”

Tayuya accepts that with a nod. She’s always been better about not knowing than Kin has. (Not knowing kind of drives Kin _insane._ ) “When do you leave?”

The genin… hesitates. “Tomorrow.” It’s a big mission. Bigger than any she’s ever done before. Kin isn’t usually the type to infiltrate, and when the stakes are this high? It’s the first time it really _means_ something, to leave Tayuya and the base behind and go forward.

Her girlfriend picks up on her somber mood, taking her hand and giving it a squeeze. “You’ll do fine,” she says, and Kin squeezes back.

They don’t spar – Kin needs to be on her toes for tomorrow – and they instead go back to their room. It’s quiet. Kin packs, and Tayuya watches. They go eat a quiet dinner together, enjoying their yakisoba, and even finish off with a round of dango.

It’s not until it’s night, until it’s time to sleep, that they really talk. They’ve both stripped down to their sleepwear, tank tops and boxer shorts, when Tayuya slips her hand underneath Kin’s top to rest over her navel. “Will you look?”

Kin shifts, turning in her girlfriend’s arms. “Why would I look for my soulmate?” she says, echoing Tayuya’s words from months ago. She lifts her own hand, pressing it to Tayuya’s shoulder, where the stylized arrow that marks her soulmate as one of Taki’s rests. “I have you. There’s no need for anyone else.”

They’re eye-to-eye, Kin only being maybe an inch taller, and they stare at each other for a long moment before Kin leans in. She presses her lips to Tayuya’s, and the redhead’s eyes flutter shut. Her lips taste like blood – she bit them recently. Kin’s are a little chapped.

She lingers there for a few moments more, before pulling back and giving her girlfriend a small smile. Tayuya opens her eyes and returns it. They’re red, blushing, all of fourteen years old and-

Kin knows they can take on the world.

* * *

Scratch it, maybe she can take on the world with _Tayuya,_ but this much exposure to Dosu and Zaku has Kin feeling really fucking homicidal. She wants to bash their heads together and leave them in the dust – but she can’t, because you need three genin to enter the chunin exams.

It’s incredibly frustrating.

Fortunately, the way isn’t far – and the moment she steps in Konoha, despite what she said to Tayuya, she’s… a bit distracted. It feels like every eye is on her. She knows it isn’t. Even if people are staring at her teammates, Dosu is the one who comes off the most threatening. They’d be staring at him.

And she can’t help but examine every single kunoichi that walks by. True, her soulmate is _probably_ around the same age as her (not necessarily, but most likely), so it means she could be any of the ones in the exams. She could also be too young to have graduated yet, a year younger – maybe she’s a little older, or already a chunin. Kin has no idea.

She tries not to think about it.

It’s not- not like she’d ever _leave_ Tayuya. The things she feels about the redhead she’s far too embarrassed to voice aloud, far too wary to let herself feel that vulnerable, but it doesn’t mean she doesn’t feel them. She’d never leave her.

Kin’s just… just curious, that’s all. What’s wrong with a little curiosity?

* * *

God, if her soulmate is the pink-haired bitch, Kin’s going to murder god himself. Or the blonde-haired bitch – that girl got in her HEAD and god, that’s like the one fucking place she has to herself anymore. At least… At least Kin didn’t have to fight Uchiha, though.

It’s the first huge time that Kin’s really questioned what Orochimaru’s thinking. He had a curse seal – a curse seal! As if she wouldn’t know what that was from all her time spent with Tayuya! – and he _defeated_ them. Beat down Zaku so soundly even _she_ felt bad for the idiot.

And not only that-

Not only that, but she’s the only one who makes it through the preliminaries. She defeats the fat dumbass who she’s paired up with easy, but Zaku falls to bug boy (yuck) and Dosu finds himself outsmarted by the Nara. It’s just her, moving on. Just her, who has a chance to defeat Uchiha.

She’s terrified. She wants Tayuya.

Zaku’s still getting looked at in the Konoha hospital, and it’s just Kin, perched on the roof of the apartment they’re staying in – well, just Kin, and Dosu creeping up behind like the creepy creeper he is. He sits next to her, their legs dangling side by side.

It’s quiet for a moment, and then he speaks. “You know we’re nothing now, right?”

She nods.

“You’re the only one that really has any hope, feh. If you can beat Uchiha…”

She shakes her head. “No.”

Dosu tips his head sideways, his one visible eye squinting at her. “No?”

“Orochimaru never meant for us to beat him.” Kin reaches up to rub at her neck. “Do you know what those markings on him were from?”

He shrugs. “I assumed some sort of Uchiha jutsu.”

“Nope. That’s one of Orochimaru’s inventions. A curse seal. Tayuya, um, has one. They give you extra power and stuff.”

They’re both quiet for a moment, absorbing that. It breaks Kin’s heart, a little. That her kage would put her on this mission… How had she fucked up? What had she screwed up so badly that he would dispose of her in such a way?

Or maybe- maybe it was a test of her, too, to see if she could survive the Uchiha? She liked that explanation a little more, the cold clamp around her heart lessening just a bit, but it-

It felt off. (Well, she’d know at the end of the mission if she survived, right?)

Dosu sighs. “Fuck.”

“Fuck is fucking right.”

* * *

Dosu suggests going after one of the other opponents so she can fight Uchiha sooner, but Kin thinks that’s pointless. As well as possibly suicidal. Sabaku no Gaara is… a terrifying force of nature, and will probably murder the shit out of the Uchiha FOR her.

If he doesn’t, and Uchiha wins? Then he’ll probably be extremely worn down from that fight, and she’ll be able to take him down easier. If Gaara wins? Uchiha will be dead, Orochimaru will be pissed but Kin will probably have a second chance because she survived (and her kage is intelligent – why waste people if you can reuse them? There’s no sense in that), and then she’ll forfeit the moment she has to fight Gaara.

God. Just thinking about fighting him sends chills down her spine.

She spends the next month training, instead, and – and touring Konoha. Enjoying herself when her body is too exhausted to do anything more (because pushing your body beyond its limits can actually cause HARM, dumbasses!), because… if everything goes wrong, this could be her last month.

Kin is going to try her absolute hardest to make sure that doesn’t happen, of course, because like hell is she going down without a fight, but it was better to be prepared for the worst case scenario rather than be an arrogant bitch – which, okay, she’s absolutely had a problem with in the past. But not now!

No. Now, she’s going to enjoy herself when she’s not busting her ass off, and then she’ll beat that Nara to kingdom come.

* * *

He takes her down so hard she gets knocked the fuck out.

* * *

The invasion happens while she’s asleep. Dosu and Zaku are killed while she’s asleep. She’s transferred to T&I, locked up, and the key is thrown away while she’s asleep.

Everything, everything is stripped from her.

_“Orochimaru was going to kill you.”_

_“You were nothing but a pawn.”_

_“We can help you.”_

_“No one will come for you.”_

_“You should cooperate.”_

They force their words through her skull, rattle them around in her brain, and she wants to SCREAM.

Her captors talk about how Orochimaru abandoned her. They talk about how she should join them, how she should talk to them, how they’ll treat her well. Over and over and over again and god she knows she’s been trained to resist this, trained to defy everything they try to coax her into believing, that yes okay maybe they’re treating her well but they’re still trying to get information out of her, she’s still NECESSARY, and she can’t listen because once she tells them she’ll be nothing but something to be disposed of-

It’s so hard when you know they’re _right,_ she realizes in one rare moment of lucidity.

Orochimaru will never come back for her. She doesn’t know if they’re telling the truth about Zaku and Dosu, but she still knows Orochimaru will never return for her. She knows her kage has written her off, probably (hopefully) thinks she’s dead, and if she ever tries to return to him, she’ll be killed as a liability. How does he know what she’s told them? How compromised she is, if she’s a sleeper agent, what?

But- She also knows she has nothing to lose by dealing with Konoha.

No. No. She does have one thing that she can lose – she can lose _Tayuya._

Orochimaru once asked who she would choose, between him and Tayuya. She had said him, of course, her kage, her savior. And yet… Yet… Orochimaru would kill her for being a liability, and he would be right to. She doesn’t dispute that.

But Tayuya wouldn’t kill her.

If Tayuya gets her… if Tayuya can save her, maybe they can run away together. It’ll hurt, and it’ll be a betrayal, but Kin realizes that she does want to live, wants to live after all and be with Tayuya.

So Kin bites her tongue, and she waits.

* * *

“Kin,” Anko says, the woman with the Curse Mark who had forsaken their kage. “Can you identify these bodies for us?”

She can.

She does.

Kimimaro has fallen – and that’s terrifying, that something could fell him, but she remembers hearing about him getting sick from Tayuya (who was very pissed she hadn’t landed the leader position), so maybe it was just that.

Those absolute freaks, Sakon and Ukon, are full of fucking _holes_ and it’s fucking _horrifying_ but it’s still them, still those fucking freaks, and Tayuya is so glad to move onto the next body, even as a sinking feeling starts to grow in her gut.

Jirobo is next, the fucking fatty bastard, and it looks like someone crushed his heart. Weren’t… weren’t Konohans supposed to be the nice ones? What the hell?

Kidomaru, like Kimimaro, looks like he could literally just be asleep – it’s kind of. Scary, really, because both of them are really intimidating and could feed Kin her own arm for breakfast if they wanted to, and she really doesn’t want to linger.

Or, well.

She wishes she had when she hits the last one.

It’s Tayuya.

It’s her Tayuya, dead on the table – she doesn’t even look like she could be asleep, no, the entire lower part of her body _crushed_ and Kin stops and stares at her, wide-eyed.

“Kin?” prompts Anko, and at that jolt of reality Kin bursts into tears and throws herself onto Tayuya’s body.

“No, no, please-“

She weeps and she thrashes when someone touches her and she lashes out and throws a punch and then all she feels is the pinch of a needle and absolute blackness.

* * *

When Kin wakes, she doesn’t move. Doesn’t sit up, doesn’t do anything, is completely still but for the rise and fall of her chest. When someone comes by with food, she doesn’t acknowledge them and she doesn’t eat. When Anko comes by in the evening to take the cold food away, Kin does nothing, and she feels the gentle press of the mattress when Anko sits next to her.

“…Your soulmate?” she asks quietly, after a moment, and that’s what rouses Kin into awareness.

“Fuck, no!” Kin yells, sitting up and glaring fiercely at the older ninja. “Tayuya was better than that! My fucking soulmate is a fucking Konoha ninja, one of you fucking shitheads that killed my fucking girlfriend!” She hurls the bowl of rice that would have been her breakfast at Anko, but the wide-eyed special jounin catches it easily. “Fuck you and fuck your village and I hope you all _rot!”_

She hurls herself down on her bed, and refuses to move, and Anko carefully picks up the tray of cold food and leaves.

Good fucking riddance.

* * *

 

They mostly leave her alone for the next few days, but they keep bringing her food, and after the first day of starving herself Kin caves and eats. She doesn’t want to. The food sticks in her throat and sticks in her stomach and she can’t taste anything but ashes, ashes and the blood from biting the inside of her mouth, but she keeps forcing it down anyway.

On the fourth day after seeing Tayuya, Kin reaches out and snags Anko’s sleeve before the woman leaves. “Hey,” she says. “Do you have questions? Because I’ll tell you everything.”

And she does.

She pours out the location of every single hideout she knows of. She gives details of every single sound ninja she’s ever worked with, every single one she’s familiar with and knows, even the experiments she’s aware of. Kin tells them all the information Tayuya’s ever told her about the curse seal (which isn’t a lot, granted). She tells them about every single mission she’s ever participated in, every single one she’s known OF even if she doesn’t have all the details, and she even tells them about how she met Orochimaru and got brought into Otogakure.

Kin feels wrung out, when she’s done. Empty. Empty of words and just _everything_ and then she waits for death. She’s told Konoha every single thing she can. She’s let every single scrap of Oto info she’s EVER had pass by her lips, and she’s no longer anything of use to them. There’s nothing she can give them. It’s time for them to kill her.

They don’t.

* * *

Kin spends two days in limbo, waiting for the other shoe to drop and waiting for them to kill her (god, please, when will they kill her, when will they end her life for good), when Anko stops by in the middle of the day.

That’s unusual. Maybe Anko’s going to be the one to kill her, and Anko is kind, so Kin’s sure it’ll be fast and not too painful and she can get her sorrowful, pathetic fuckup of a life over with.

Anko is not here to kill her.

Instead, Anko steps aside, and lets another girl into the small room that is Kin’s cell for the time being. Kin vaguely remembers seeing her at the chunin exams, at that time that seems so long ago. She’s got short dark hair, and a Byakugan that marks her as part of the Hyuuga clan – right, right, this was the chick that almost got straight up murdered by her family member.

God, clans are fucked up.

“Who the fuck are you,” Kin asks, flat as can be.

The other girl reaches up, very carefully, and pulls off her headband. There’s a music note, emblazoned smack dab in the middle of her forehead, and Kin gapes at her.

“M-My name…” She inhales, exhales. “My n-name is Hyuuga Hinata,” she says. “And I, um, I think I’m your soulmate.”

…

“The absolute _fuck_ ,” says Kin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have absolutely no idea what inspired this. but there are gonna be two more chapters. anyway. hope you liked???
> 
> as always, u can find me at ftcoye on tumblr, where i take drabble prompts!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uwu hello again

When Hinata is five years old, she molds chakra for the first time. For most of her classmates, she knows, chakra is something offhandedly mentioned in class, a “big kid” thing that they’ll learn later on. But for her – the Hyuuga heiress – she has to start earlier. Learn faster.

It’s why her father has her sticking leaves to her palm (trying to, at least) and she’s desperate to not disappoint him. He had told her Mother was very good with her chakra, _very_ good, and there’s _nothing_ Hinata wants more than to be like her mother.

So when she finally manages it, the small leaf gluing itself to her tiny palm, Hinata looks up with a gap-toothed grin. She’s sure Father will be pleased. She has finally done it!

What she doesn’t expect is for him to pale, staring at her with unadulterated _fear._

“F… Father?” she questions timidly, confused, only for him to _lunge_ at her. Hinata tries to dodge, tries to push herself to her feet and to scramble away, but he’s too fast for her. He grabs her by the shoulder, fingers digging in so tight that she cries out, and drags the fingers of his other hand at her forehead, pulling and tugging the skin and it hurts and she can’t help it – she cries.

Father ignores her.

* * *

Hinata has her forehead wrapped firmly in bandages and she’s sent to her room to stay there in isolation. No one’s supposed to bother her – no one’s supposed to come in. She’s supposed to stay there until Father comes back and tells her she can see people again.

But Neji-nii comes in anyway.

“What happened?” he asks, and his face pales as his eyes hit her forehead and see the bandages there. He swallows, sharply, hollow and horrified. “Did… did he?”

Hinata doesn’t care that Neji-nii doesn’t like her and has almost never talked to her, she bursts into more tears and flings herself at her cousin. “I d-don’t-“ she stammers out through sobs, trying so hard to tell him and not knowing what to tell him but still wanting to tell Neji-nii and have him explain it or help her or-

He activates his Byakugan and stares at her forehead like he’s never seen it before.

“What?” she asks quietly, because she wants to know so badly, and she wipes at her eyes and sniffles, swallowing down another sob. “What… what is it?”

“Your soulmark,” he says quietly, and he deactivates it, meeting her eyes.

She feels pain, sharp in her stomach out of fear, because to have one on her _forehead…_ And from father’s reaction it must… it must not be Konoha…

“Where… where’s it from?” she asks, because maybe it’s Suna at least, cause… cause they’re friends with Suna, right?

“I don’t know,” Neji-nii says, and how- how can he not know, he’s, he’s Neji-nii! “It’s not one I know.”

That sets off another bout of tears, another well of sobs, and Neji-nii holds her throughout them all.

* * *

When Father returns from the Hokage, his face is grim. His voice is harsh. He has no words of encouragement for Hinata, no explanations when she asks, and he doesn’t reprimand Neji-nii for coming in.

He says nothing more about Hinata being the heiress.

* * *

From then on, Hinata must wear a headband – just like the one that Neji-nii does, and all the other Branch Members that are not accomplished enough to have a forehead protector. She wears a purple headband that she slips underneath her bangs and the Main Family doesn’t speak to her.

Hinata cries, more often than she’d like to admit, going to class with red-rimmed eyes and tear-stained cheeks, and she has no friends. No one who wants to talk to her, no one who wants to be with her, no one no one no one.

The only companion she ever has, now, is Neji-nii. He drops her off at her classroom every day and picks her up at the end – he’s the one who trains her after school, the one who walks her through every single step, because Father doesn’t train her anymore, Father doesn’t even _look_ at her, and Neji-nii’s eyes soften whenever he meets hers.

When she’s seven, she learns about the seals on the members of the Branch Family. Neji-nii sits her down and tells her all about them and she’s so horrified she feels like throwing up. “I’m so… so sorry,” she tells him, and she wants to reach out and hug him but she doesn’t know if he wants her to touch him. “I didn’t- I didn’t know, I’m sorry, I’m-“

He hugs her and she cries into his chest and he cries, just a little bit, into her shoulder. “It’s not your fault,” he says. “You’re… one of us now, almost.”

And Hinata knows that he’s right.

Maybe she doesn’t have a seal on her forehead – maybe she _can’t,_ because she has the soulmark there, maybe they _can’t_ do a seal on top of a mark – but she does have a mark there and she has to keep it covered and she’ll never, ever be a part of the Main Family, not anymore.

Not with a mysterious mark to a strange village that no one knows, and not when it’s flat on her forehead. She’ll never be a part of that.

It’s… It’s okay, she guesses. It’s not like she had wanted to be the head of the Hyuuga family anyway.

* * *

She grows and so do her classmates around her, and people start using chakra and getting their soulmarks. Ino proudly shows off the Konoha symbol that appears on her shoulder, and wears shirts that show it off whenever she can. All the girls who get Konoha ones are excited – so many of them like Sasuke, which Hinata doesn’t get at _all,_ because he’s not mean but he’s not really nice, either – but you can tell when people get one that isn’t Konoha because they _don’t_ mention it and they _don’t_ show it off.

No one thinks Hinata has one that’s not Konoha, because even if she did have one from Konoha she wouldn’t be showing it off, so at least that’s… that’s something.

The boys aren’t as excited about them as the girls are, and Hinata wonders, wonders so much.

Sasuke never mentions his, much to the disappointment and excitement of many of her classmates. Naruto doesn’t ever mention his, either, and Hinata tells herself to not be disappointed by that, that it doesn’t matter what his soulmark is because Naruto isn’t her soulmate.

She’s tied to the music note on her forehead.

When Haruno Sakura’s soulmark comes, though, Hinata happens to be watching. She sees the girl finally, finally manage to get a leaf stick to her palm when they’re supposed to be collecting flowers, sees her face light up and then look at her hands and abruptly fall. “Byakugan,” Hinata whispers, activating it and seeing right through her and-

And-

_There’s a music note on her wrist._

Hinata stiffens, staring from her distance, and watches as Sakura tugs her sleeve down a bit more so it covers the mark fully and says absolutely nothing to Ino, who’s sitting right next to her and hasn’t noticed. Sakura has the same mark. _Sakura has the same mark._

She deactivates her Byakugan and tries to breathe.

* * *

When Neji-nii comes to pick her up after class that day, she doesn’t leave with him, right away. “Wait,” she tells him, and Neji-nii sighs like it’s a huge favor but waits, and Hinata approaches Sakura at her desk. Ino’s talking to some other girls and Sakura’s all scrunched up quiet in her seat and Hinata whispers. “Sakura,” she says so quietly as she stops next to her desk, and the pink-haired girl’s head snaps up, eyes wide in surprise that Hinata is talking to her. “I saw your… your mark. C-Can…” She’s so nervous, so terribly nervous, but her need to talk overrides all of that. “C-Can you c-come with… with me?”

Sakura bites her lip, considering, takes a glance back at Ino and then nods. “Okay,” she says, and she follows.

Hinata tells Neji-nii they need to talk somewhere private and while he glances between the two of them curiously, he doesn’t ask – at least, not yet – and he instead leads them to a training ground that’s not super far from the school. He activates his Byakugan, takes a quick sweep around, and then nods at Hinata. “No one’s watching,” he tells her, and she sags in relief.

She honestly has no idea how to broach this topic, how to explain, so instead Hinata goes for the easy thing that prevents her from saying any words: she unties her headband from her forehead and lets it drop, and Sakura’s eyes go huge.

“That’s-“ She holds out her wrist, pulling up her sleeve so her music note is bared to the world while Neji-nii sucks in air harshly between his teeth. “That’s the same as me!” Her eyes are so intense, fixed on Hinata’s forehead. “Where is it from? What village?”

Hinata quails a bit, uncertain, and glances at Neji-nii for help – he meets her eyes and with a small sigh and a shake of his head, he steps up. “We don’t know,” he tells Sakura, whose gaze snaps over to meet his. “There’s no village with that symbol.”

Sakura deflates – not the answer she had been hoping for. “So what… what does it mean?” she asks quietly, rubbing her thumb over the mark as her sudden bravado deserts her.

“It… I think m-maybe it… it m-means it doesn’t exist… y- _yet_ ,” Hinata quietly offers up, because that’s her currently running idea and she doesn’t want to drop it. Either that, or it’s so tiny and obscure they wouldn’t know it.

The other girl nods slowly, taking that in, and when her gaze meets Hinata’s again, there’s a bit of spark, a bit of hope. “You… you think?”

“Yes,” Hinata says, even though she’s not sure about _anything_ except for Neji-nii’s support nowadays, and she nods. “It’s… It’s gotta be.”

* * *

Sakura always wears a wristband after that.

She covers up her mark and doesn’t say a word about it to anyone – Hinata knows this because she and Ino get in a huge, explosive fight about soulmarks about a week later and stop speaking to each other. Instead, Sakura spends time with Hinata, and she finally has a _friend._

It’s her and Sakura at school, eating lunch together and being partners whenever you need one and practicing together, and Neji-nii always takes them to training grounds after school and sometimes Hinata goes over to Sakura’s house and sometimes Neji-nii does too and Father never ever asks where she’s going.

“What do you think your soulmate’s like?” Sakura asks Hinata quietly when they’re in her room, one day. “I hope mine’s handsome, like Sasuke, and really smart and strong.”

Hinata thinks. “Happy,” she says softly, cheeks burning as she stares at the ground. “Never… ever gives up and always keeps going.”

Sakura laughs and nudges Hinata’s shoulder. “Like Naruto?” she questions, wiggling her eyebrows, and Hinata’s face turns even darker and she buries her face in her hands.

 _Like you, too,_ Hinata doesn’t say, because they’re both bound to the music notes and no amount of wishing or wanting to hold hands with her best friend will change that.

* * *

When she’s ten, Father speaks to her again. “I will be retrieving you from school tomorrow,” he tells her one evening, appearing in her doorway like he’s always been there.

Hinata has a minor panic attack, trying not to shake, but she nods and the moment she acknowledges him Father is gone, just like that. What? What what what?

She tells Neji-nii the next morning, when he takes her to school, and he frowns. “Be careful,” he says, and if there’s anything that Hinata’s grateful has come out of this whole mess, it’s her Neji-nii. “Don’t… trust him, okay?”

It’s so strange, so strange and kind of scary to be told to not trust her own parent, but Hinata knows that he’s correct so she nods.

She’s off, today, getting answers wrong on their quiz and hands shaking so hard her kunai go wide and Sakura looks over with such wide-eyed, gentle concern. “Hinata?” she asks, taking the other girl’s hands in her own. “Are you okay?”

Hinata is not okay, not in the slightest, but she can’t really say that because that would lead to explaining about her Father so she just nods and squeezes Sakura’s hands so tightly it must hurt, but her friend doesn’t say anything, just squeezes back.

And at the end of the day, Father is waiting outside the building.

“This way,” he says, and he sets off towards the Hokage’s tower. Hinata stares after him for a second, caught off guard, before she hurries to keep up. His legs are so much longer than hers, and while he is walking, it’s a fast-paced walk that leaves her struggling to keep up. She can feel his gaze upon her head, can feel what he thinks even if she doesn’t look up.

_Failure, failure, failure._

They’re ushered in the Hokage’s office as if they are expected (and they probably are), and the Hokage is sitting at his desk. “Lord Hiashi,” he greets her Father, and Hinata keeps her eyes trained on her feet. “Lady Hinata.”

His voice is warm, and she hesitantly peeks up – his face is crinkled in a smile, eyes fond, and she slowly relaxes. “Lady Hinata,” he says again. “Could you take off your headband?”

Shock goes through her, paralyzing her and she glances up at her Father for reassurance because he said to never take it off in public (even though she broke that rule for Sakura) but the Hokage is telling her so it’s not like she can disobey, right? Annoyance is clear on her Father’s face as he nods at her. “Listen to the Hokage,” he says, and he’s so short with her she shrinks back.

Hesitantly, she unties her headband, pulling it off, and immediately feels like she wants to disappear when the Hokage’s eyes go to her forehead. He sags slightly, looking so tired and so exhausted. “Yes,” he tells her Father. “That’s the Sound symbol, I’m afraid.”

Her Father scowls but Hinata’s heart beats with excitement. Sound? Sound Village, then? It’s a fitting name for the symbol on her forehead and it means that there’s a _village_ and there’s somewhere she can start _looking_ and- “S-Sound?” she stammers, and both sets of eyes go to her. She cringes, but- But. But she wants to know so very badly. “Is… is my m-mark Sound? That’s where… that’s where m-my soul… soulmate is?”

The Hokage looks at her with such sorrow in his eyes, and she doesn’t understand. “Yes, my dear,” he tells her. “I’m afraid so.”

“A… afraid?”

Father is the one who answers her question, because of course he’s the one to break the news to her. “The leader of Sound Village,” he says. “Is Orochimaru.”

* * *

Hinata spends the next week in a daze.

She knows who Orochimaru is, of course – her education, even Branch education, is more informative than what they learn at school. It makes sense. Konoha doesn’t want to talk about its failures. (If she ever makes it as a ninja, she knows she’ll never make it in the books for exactly that reason.)

Her soulmate… is in Orochimaru’s village.

It’s like there are eyes on her wherever she goes. Maybe she’s making it up, maybe she’s not – she doesn’t want to check with her Byakugan, and if people really _are_ spying on her she doesn’t think she’ll be able to catch them – but she feels like it, like eyes are crawling all over her and watching her just in case because if her soulmate is in Orochimaru’s village-

Does that make her a traitor?

It feels like it does. It feels like that’s what Father has decided and what the eyes that haunt her have decided and Hinata feels like crying because she doesn’t _know._ What if her soulmate is this magical and amazing, wonderful person that she’d rather run off with them than spend any time longer in Konoha? That makes her a traitor, doesn’t it, someone who would abandon their nation for another?

She cries herself to sleep every night. Neji-nii knows why she’s so distraught, and she envies him so. His simple Konoha mark on his shoulder – it could belong to anyone. The world is open to him in that way and she envies him, but whenever she sees his forehead bare she feels abruptly bad for doing so.

He begins sleeping in her room with her, holding her, and Father says nothing.

(She wishes Hanabi were sleeping with them as well, both of them and her younger sister, but she hasn’t spoken to her baby sister since that fateful day so many years ago and she doesn’t think she’ll ever be able to speak with her again.)

Sakura notices that something’s wrong, of course. Sakura is her best friend, along with Neji-nii, and Hinata wishes everything were less complicated. That there were no soulmates that might turn you into a traitor, that she could just reach over and hold Sakura’s hand and when they’re older they can go on dates and stuff and get married and live happily ever after. They can have cute little babies with Byakugan eyes and pink hair and Neji-nii will be the best uncle in the world and- and- and-

And it can never, ever happen in a million years so Hinata says nothing.

It’s only when a week has passed that Hinata finally tells Sakura everything. Neji-nii leads them to a practice ground again and keeps a lookout for anyone and Hinata tells Sakura that their soulmates are from Sound – and when Sakura doesn’t know who Orochimaru is, Hinata tells her all about that, too.

Her friend’s face is pale and drawn and Hinata is grateful to have another person who realizes how serious this is who is _also_ in the same boat when Sakura comes to a completely different conclusion.

Sakura balls her hands up into two fists on her thighs and nods sharply. “I guess we’ve got to save them,” she says with sheer, raw determination and Hinata is blown away by this girl sitting in front of her.

“What?” she whispers.

“I… I dunno about _you,_ ” Sakura says, “But I’m not joining Orochimaru. So… So we’ve gotta be saving our soulmates from him, then, right?”

All this time. All this time, Hinata has been thinking about someone swooping in to save her. Someone who will whisk her away from a house where people have seals on their heads and Fathers don’t acknowledge their daughters, where she’s a weak failure of a Hyuuga and a ninja- Someone brave and determined and someone who _shines_ like Naruto and Sakura, but… maybe.

Maybe that was supposed to be Hinata all along?

“Right,” Hinata says, and she smiles.

* * *

She grows.

A determination has seized hold of her, one that hasn’t ever existed before, and she rises to the top. She battles with Sakura over the top kunoichi of the class, but it’s a fun battle, a rivalry that brings smiles to their face as they shove tests in each other’s faces, trying to beat each other’s scores.

They talk about their soulmates, sometimes, on the occasions when Hinata has the courage to sleep over at Sakura’s house (because she never asks Father, so she’s never certain if this is what will make him notice her, this is what will make him yell). “Do you think,” Sakura asks one evening, before the words stick in her throat and she stares at the ceiling. “Do you… do you think they’ll like us?”

Hinata doesn’t need to ask who she’s talking about, even if they had been talking chocolate just two seconds before. “Your… your soulmate,” she says, and she turns over in the blankets tangled on the floor, looking at her friend. “Is so lucky to have you.”

Sakura’s face darkens in a blush and she reaches over to shove Hinata’s shoulder lightly, deeply embarrassed. “Shut up,” she says, but there’s no heat in it. “So’s yours, you know.”

“Thanks,” Hinata whispers, and even though she knows it’s part of a dream that can’t happen, she reaches over and holds Sakura’s hand anyway.

* * *

Hinata graduates. Well, Sakura graduates, too, and so does the rest of their class. Neji-nii’s already graduated, already been put on a team with a weapons-loving kunoichi and an overexuberant fighter who is more than happy to announce to the world about his soulmate from Suna, and now it’s time for Sakura and Hinata.

Sakura gets Sasuke and Naruto. In another world, where Sakura doesn’t have someone in Sound waiting for her, she’d be over the moon. Beyond excited. But as it is, she gives Hinata a grin and promises to be nice to Naruto, for her sake.

Hinata ends up with Kiba and Shino, who she’s never really spoken to but seem nice enough, and Kurenai-sensei is really nice, too, so they all get along well. She really likes her team, and having her forehead protector means it can replace her headband and look so much more natural that way, like she’s a real shinobi.

But there’s one little issue, because nothing can ever go quite right for her.

Hanabi graduates, too, from a few years below.

Hinata only knows because she happens to catch a glimpse of her sister and the protector she wears, and her eyes go wide. “H-Hanabi?” she stammers, because she hasn’t spoken to her sister in so long, not since Hanabi was a little baby. “You… You graduated?”

Hanabi barely gives her the time of day. “Yes,” she says, and she walks away.

* * *

Kurenai-sensei approaches her about her soulmark in the second week.

“I just wanted to let you know that I know about your soulmate,” she says, setting a gentle hand on Hinata’s shoulder as she speaks with a soft voice. “If you ever need to talk about it, I’m here.”

Hinata nods and tries not to tear up, because it shouldn’t mean what it does because she does have someone to talk to about it, but hearing an adult look out for her like this is… it’s a lot. “Should I tell the… the others?”

Kurenai-sensei regards her evenly, betraying not a hint of her thoughts on the matter. “It’s your choice,” she says. “But for what it’s worth, I don’t think they’ll care.”

She tells them right before the Chunin exams, and Kurenai-sensei is right.

* * *

There are three sound genin in the Chunin Exams, and neither of the girls is excited. They seem… frightening. Not anyone who needs to be rescued, not at all. They attack Kabuto and announce how good they are to all the other genin and Hinata feels her stomach shrivel up.

None of these people must be her soulmate. It was foolish to even think of it – foolish to even get excited at the first sign of a music note. Of course it’s not the first genin she meets. Of course not.

Hinata doesn’t have much time to worry about them, though.

Because yes, the first round goes fine. The whole team passes their test with flying colors, and they get a scroll oh-so-quickly in the second round. It’s only… only when they get to the preliminaries that Hinata-

She has to face Hanabi.

Every part of her shakes, every part of her trembles and she wants to quit and forfeit right now but- “You can do it, Hinata!” Sakura roars, and she looks up to see her best friend grinning at her. Neji-nii stands next to her, uncomfortable by the hand that Sakura has on his shoulder, but he nods at her. Naruto starts to yell encouragement from Sakura’s other side and Hinata starts crying on her walk down. They’re happy tears – they’re tears of relief.

Hanabi scoffs. “Are you that scared?” she taunts, and Hinata wishes that she had never been left alone with Father for so long, that he was the one she focused on so much.

“No,” Hinata says, scrubbing at her eyes, and she settles into her stance. “I’m not… n-not scared at all.”

Her sister wins. It’s something that Hinata expects. She expects Hanabi to win, expects her to beat down on Hinata, but Hinata keeps getting up and keeps going forward and-

She thinks of her soulmate, and if she can’t even save her little sister from what their Father wants to mold her into, how can she save them from Orochimaru’s clutches?

“Why do you keep getting up!?” Hanabi yells at her, and Hinata rises to her feet. “Stay down!”

Hinata smiles at her. “Because… because I love you, Hanabi.”

Neji-nii is the one that stops Hanabi’s deathstrike.

Neji-nii is there in a moment, catching Hanabi’s blow in his hands and turning it aside, and then catching Hinata as she crumples for the last time. Hanabi pulls back with a sneer. “Branch house protecting Branch, huh?”

He stares at her and he nods sharply. “No one else will,” he says, and she doesn’t have a response to that.

* * *

The hospital is quiet and white. Hinata’s in there the entire time training is going on for the third part. Lee is stuck in there, too, trapped with her, and they end up sharing a room for a bit because Hinata can convince him to stay in bed and not run off to exercise at the first opportunity.

There’s one night when it’s just the two of them and Lee exhales shakily, stares up at the ceiling. “That boy,” he says, quietly, quieter than she’s ever heard his voice. “I was close enough to see, when we were fighting. He has a Konohan soulmark.”

“Oh,” says Hinata quietly, because she knows of Lee’s own Suna one, and she wonders the same thing he’s wondering – is it? Could it be?

It doesn’t mean they have to be, of course – that’s the interesting part of soulmarks. You know the where, but you do not know the who. It could mean nothing. Lee could be destined for the boy’s teammate, covered in strange paint, or someone else altogether. It could turn out that the terrifying boy is actually a plant from Sound and he’s Sakura’s soulmate all along.

Or no one found their soulmate, during these Chunin Exams, and they’ll all have to wait.

“If he is,” she ends up saying. “He… he needs to t-treat you a lot n-nicer.”

Lee laughs, and she pretends – for his sake – that she can’t hear the tears just below the surface.

* * *

Neji-nii is to fight Hanabi and it’s the only thing that gets Hinata out of the hospital, in the end.

She begs him to not hurt her, not too badly, and he rests two hands on her shoulders and levels her with a serious look. “Hinata,” he says. “She tried to kill you, and she’s the next head of the Main House.”

Hinata deflates. “I… I know, but…”

“I’ll be careful,” Neji-nii tells her, and Hinata thinks that’s the best she’ll get in the end.

Neji-nii wins.

At least, that’s what Kiba tells her later – Hinata collapses about halfway through the fight, and that’s when a literal war breaks out what with Suna invading, so maybe it’s an okay thing that Hinata misses it and only wakes up in the hospital when it’s all over with.

She wakes up and Orochimaru has killed the Hokage, they have a new one named Tsunade, and Neji-nii is a chunin.

And before she can leave the hospital-

Sasuke is gone.

* * *

She doesn’t know if your soulmark actually fades when your soulmate dies. Some stories her mom read her said that they did – but her mom had said not everything in them was true, so she doesn’t know.

Still, it’s a relief to feel it up there when everyone comes piling back, reports of dead Sound nin being tossed around. There were five they beat, five they killed, and between those five and the three other genin Hinata wonders if she’s ever going to meet a sound genin that actually lives.

Sakura is inconsolable. She cries and weeps and Hinata holds her and tries to be with her as much as she can. “He was my friend,” she cries. “And he’s- he’s-“

Their talks of saving their soulmates from Orochimaru seem so silly, now.

Seem so naïve.

When she’s released from the hospital, Hinata doesn’t go home. Instead – she’s escorted straight to the Hokage’s office. Lady Tsunade half-glares at her over her desk and Hinata tries to desperately think of what she could have done, even as the ANBU disappear from behind her. “You,” Lady Tsunade says, and Hinata shrinks in her seat. “Your soulmate is… is a Sound Ninja.”

She sounds more than a little tipsy, but Hinata nods slowly, heart sinking. Does… does she think Hinata’s responsible in some way? Does she think she helped? That she did something- That-

The Hokage lets out an explosive sigh. “You’re the only one we’ve got on record,” she says, and that makes sense because Hinata knows Sakura never told a soul. “And we’ve got a Sound genin sitting in a holding cell who claims to have a Konoha soulmark.”

Hinata’s jaw drops. It- They-

“You… You do?” she questions, so timidly, so shy. “Do they… they really have one?”

Lady Tsunade smiles, devious and slow. “I’m not sure. But we sure could use a Byakugan to find out.”

* * *

The proctor for the first part of the exam, Mitarashi Anko, is the one who leads her down to the cells. She pauses. “Orochimaru was my jounin-sensei,” she says slowly, and Hinata had no idea and stares up at her with wide eyes. “I idolized him, when I was younger. It’s easy for him to get his claws in kids.” She stares past Hinata at something that isn’t there, before she shakes her head, clapping a hand on Hinata’s shoulder and giving her a small smile. “Give her a chance, okay?”

Hinata nods, because of _course_ she will.

She activates her Byakugan before they enter the room, though, just to check. It’s one of the genin from the Chunin Exams – she doesn’t remember her name, but resting on her navel is a Konohan leaf. Hinata sucks in a sharp breath, deactivating, and nods at Anko. “It’s… It’s there,” she stammers, and the woman grins.

“Good,” she says, and she opens the door.

Anko steps in first, Hinata practically tiptoeing in behind her, and it’s only when the Sound genin sits up that Anko steps aside to reveal her. “Who the fuck are you?” asks the other girl, and Hinata tries not to tremble.

It’s like Sakura, all over again – the easiest way to show, right?

She reaches up carefully, pulling off her forehead protector, and the other girl stares at her, mouth hanging open in shock. “M-My name…” She inhales. Exhales. _You can do this,_ she thinks, and she forges onward. “My n-name is Hyuuga Hinata. And I, um, I think I’m your soulmate.”

…

“The absolute _fuck,_ ” her soulmate says, and Hinata’s heart sinks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks so much for reading!! i have no idea why i'm so deeply invested in this idea and yet... here we are...
> 
> anyway!! you can find me on tumblr as 'ftcoye', where i take drabble prompts!! i'll be back with the third and final chapter of this in two weeks - see you then, and i hope you enjoy! thank you for all your kind words!


End file.
